


i never knew daylight could be so violent

by WashiEaglewings



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Gen, I'm sure this will all be jossed when KH3 comes out in 2810, KH3 Speculation, but I'm having fun let me live
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-26
Updated: 2017-05-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 01:18:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11002974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WashiEaglewings/pseuds/WashiEaglewings
Summary: Kairi expected growing pains and explosions as parts of her training. Having her Keyblade stolen by its rightful owner... not so much. Inspired by Letterblade's "Take This Key."





	i never knew daylight could be so violent

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Take This Key](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9918191) by [Letterblade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Letterblade/pseuds/Letterblade). 



> It took five months and an amazing headcanon fic by Letterblade to compress my 2.8 feels into fic, but it happened and we're here now.
> 
> Come find me on tumblr as awakingdormancy

Kairi’s not sure if days or weeks or even months had passed since she and Riku had left the Mysterious Tower. Time had lost its urgency as she’d trained alongside Lea in Merlin’s “training chamber,” breaking more pots and barrels than she’d even seen before in her life and learning magic and the Keyblade. It had all felt like a dream. She’s almost afraid she’ll wake up from it here and find herself back in her bedroom on the Islands.

Yen Sid’s chambers is as she remembers—though admittedly, she doesn’t remember much; there were more pressing things at hand than memorizing the pattern of his curtains or the curled scripts on book spines—and she takes a quiet peace in that. She doesn’t quite remember Yen Sid’s gaze being this piercing. When she’d been here before the bulk of his attention had been focused on Riku and Mickey; now, despite Lea standing beside her, he examines her with a focused calm that almost demands proper posture. “Merlin has informed me that you both have made excellent progress.”

She knows he means her skill with the Keyblade, and that _has_ happened: she knows how to strike and slash and move her body to evade an attack. But between training sessions Kairi has kept a closer eye on other changes: she has honest-to-goodness muscles now, aches in places she didn’t know existed, a new trembling beneath her skin like she’ll burst if she doesn’t cast a spell _right this second._ Kairi still isn’t sure if this has all changed because of the Keyblade, or if this is what control feels like.

“Ordinarily I would be sending each of you off to further hone your skills off-world, but these are turbulent times; you both are key targets for Xehanort.”

Lea rocks onto the balls of his heels, his sharp brow furrowed. “Kairi I get, with her Princess of Heart deal.” He says this flippantly, and Kairi frowns. Lea doesn’t seem to notice. “Don’t tell me I’ve got a target on my back for being part of the Organization?”

“As a former member of Organization Thirteen, you do have key knowledge that could illuminate our understanding of Xehanort’s plans. We know the ultimate goal,” he continues, as Lea starts to retort, “is to collect thirteen darknesses to combat the seven lights. But a man like Xehanort will have left many roads open.”

“In other words, you’re our secret weapon,” Kairi deadpans.

Lea smirks. “Not so secret after that stint with Sora. But I see your point. So what’re we here for?”

Yen Sid nods slowly. “I received a message from Chip and Dale. Riku and Mickey are due to return momentarily.”

Kairi’s heart soars, and she steps forward with a smile on her face. “So does that mean… will Aqua be with them?”

“Master Aqua,” he gently corrects. “And yes. Once she has arrived we will begin to take steps to recover Ventus, and locating Terra.”

“So when’ll they be back?” Lea asks.

Yen Sid chuckles. “They should be…”

And maybe this is another quirk of the Keyblade, but Kairi _feels_ their arrival before she sees the small white ship in the sky. She bows and dismisses herself with a rushed “ThankyouMasterYenSid!” before flying from the room and down the spiral staircase. She is dimly aware of Lea calling her name.

She flings open the main door just as the Gummi Ship touches ground, throwing blades of grass into the air. She waits until the engine powers down before stepping forward. A door opens; Mickey flies out, only offering a sharp “Hang on, I’m gettin’ the Master!”

“Why,” she starts, and turns. Riku looks worse for wear, with shadows under his eyes and a nasty cut on his upper lip. There is a woman in his arms.

+

Riku fills her in later that night, illuminated by stars under darker twilight skies. (Another quirk of the Keyblade, she decides: going to places where “passing time” is an unkept promise.)

“Some sort of crab-shaped Heartless found us at the very last minute,” he says, leaning against the smooth stone tower. “We all got hit pretty badly, and at the end of the fight we just… appeared in the ocean. Not Destiny Islands,” he says, when Kairi opens to ask a question. “A girl named Moana found on some teeny rock in the middle of nowhere, said we’d come from some sort of… Realm of Monsters. After that, Mickey was able to summon a Gummi Ship and we were able to get back.” He pauses.

When he doesn’t continue, Kairi leans forward. "She's going to be okay though, right?"

"Master Yen Sid said she would," he says, but he doesn't sound confident. "Kairi, I have a strong resistance to darkness and I was only down there for a few weeks. I'll probably still be sick tomorrow. She was..."

"Down there for years," Kairi finishes, and gulps.

"But her heart's still full of light, Kai. Ansem the Wise was down there too, but even with that black coat he was still affected. That’s what I don’t understand.” Riku holds his head in his hands. “And to be honest, it scares me.”

Riku’s made progress, allowing herself and Sora to come close and touch him, but he’s still flighty. Kairi is slow to move toward him, slower still to gently grab his hand. She’s taken again by the rough callouses on his hands, how _permanent_ they feel. If she trains long and hard enough, will her hands feel the same? The thought is quietly pleasing.

“It’s okay to be scared,” Kairi says slowly. “This might be a little selfish, but… I’m glad you all are here.”

“Me too,” he says. He squeezes her hand gently, smiling softly. “Thanks, Kairi.”

“‘Course,” she says, and leans her head into his shoulder. There’s a long moment where they just stand there, taking solace in each other’s warmth. Kairi’s thumb brushes against Riku’s knuckles, and she smiles when his breathing quickens. “So now we just… wait for them to recover, right?”

They’re so close that she feels him nod. “Master Yen Sid said something about getting everyone together so we’re all on the same page. We still have a lot of work to do after this.”

“The seven lights,” Kairi murmurs, and sighs. The whole reason she’s here. She turns to Riku with a grin, her own hand flexing. “Speaking of. Wanna spar?”

The question takes him off guard; Riku turns to her with comically-wide eyes, and she knows his brain is whirring fifty miles an hour. Destiny’s Embrace fills it, a little too heavy but otherwise familiar. She practically hears the _click_ of Riku’s recognition, and laughs as he shakes his head. “And you made fun of _me_ for turning into Sora.”

She doesn’t answer but steps away from him, holding her keyblade in a challenging stance. Training with Lea is one thing, but he wasn’t a Keyblade Master—and more importantly, he wasn’t one of her boys. “Consider this payback for not bringing me with you to your test.”

He says nothing as Way to Dawn flares into being. The piercing blue eye in the guard seems _alive_ somehow, and she straightens to meet it. Riku twists the blade in his hand, casually studious. “Sora’ll be sad he missed this.”

She grins. “Loser gets to tell him?”

“You’re on.”

The fight doesn’t last long: she keeps to offense, trying to break his guard with hard strikes and Firas. He dances around her like it’s a game, and normally that would tick her off, but there’s a good-natured gleam in his eyes as they parry. The sharp sound of their blades knocking against each other rings through the air, joined by Kairi’s surprised laughter. She isn’t on her ass, and surely that means something?

Or—wait, grass. Crap.

Riku stands above her with a hand on his waist, Way to Dawn held loose at his side. “Good try.”

The tip of her keyblade glows; she smells sharp ozone before a weak Thundara strikes him. It isn’t strong enough to hurt him, but the surprise in his eyes makes her momentary defeat worth it. She pushes back up into a standing position and charges, careful to hit him with the blunt side of Destiny’s Embrace. He meets it at the very last second, leaning in so they’re nose to nose. “Better?” she asks.

“Better,” Riku says, and mutters something under his breath. A spell—she’s sent flying and lands hard on the ground, one lock of hair frozen solid. She huffs and pushes herself back up, guarding against another Blizzard. Bits of ice fall to the ground, glistening in the twilight. Riku seems quietly delighted. “Want to keep going?”

“Now I see why you and Sora were always at this,” she says, and charges forward to attack his rear.

If she sees the momentary flicker of movement three floors up, she doesn’t remember it when the two retire for the evening.

+

She’d been right there with Riku when Mickey had talked about his last meeting with Aqua, and her role in closing the door to Kingdom Hearts—not the real Kingdom Hearts, the one Xehanort was trying to stop, and not even Xemnas’s fake contraption, and to be honest trying to keep them all straight made her head hurt after a few seconds of thought—and Kairi had thought to herself, _she’s just like one of the stories the Mayor used to read._ The ones that were all about knights fighting for love and gods succumbing to fatal flaws, that she used to write little stories about in the journals Sora and Riku were never, _ever_ allowed to read Or Else.

And somehow, despite seeing Sora and Riku fight first-hand and knowing they had saved the worlds _twice_ , she had never been able to think of them like heroes in the legends. She could still think of them as just her boys, who could come home and goof off like any of the other teenagers on the islands. Aqua and her friends sounded different, _mythic_ in the way tragedy had fallen on them so catastrophically.

So when Riku had come to tell her that Aqua wanted to see her, she might have let her imagination run away from her. They would enter the room and trumpets would sound, and Aqua would be standing there with the sunlight shining on her armor, a larger-than-life presence that would stand proudly and impart some great wisdom upon her. And Kairi would be praised for her bravery, recognized for her hard work and determination.

But when he leads Kairi into the large bedroom on the west side of the tower, she doesn’t see any of that. There’s only a woman on the bed, made small by the blankets piled at her feet.

She’s younger than Kairi thought she’d be. At least, she _thinks._ It’s hard to tell under the weight that pulls her shoulders down, or the naked wariness in her dark blue eyes, or the hollow look of her face. There are sandwich scraps and a half-full cup of juice on the tiny bedside table, and crumbs on her fingers that quickly thread together when she looks up at them.

Riku clears his throat, standing at attention. “Kairi, this is Master Aqua. Aqua, this is—”

“I remember you,” Aqua says, her voice almost a whisper in this large room. Moonlight is rippling through the thin curtains, dappling the carpeted floor. “That day in Radiant Garden. You gave me flowers.”

Riku’s eyes are curious on hers. She averts his gaze; she still doesn’t remember her days before falling to Destiny Islands, despite wracking her brains and having a self-described “memory witch” sleeping peacefully in the depths of her heart. “Well, um… Master—”

“Just Aqua,” she says, almost firmly. When Kairi looks back up Aqua is staring at her, almost like she’s analyzing Kairi. “It’s okay if you don’t remember. You were very little.”

She doesn’t look old, Kairi finally realizes, but haunted. She isn’t sure which one is worse.

“I saw you the other night,” Aqua says, and shifts her posture on the bed. “Fighting with a Keyblade. Who gave it to you?”

Kairi tilts her head. “Well, Riku kind of just… handed it to me in the World that Never Was,” she says, and turns to him. He looks similarly confused. “You never did tell me where you found it.”

“We didn’t really have the time. “He scratches the top of his head, face dark with thought. “I was looking around Hollow Bastion—Radiant Garden, I guess now—and came across this little room.” Riku sighs, looking up in concentration. “The Keyblade was there, but it didn’t look like Kairi’s. It turned into Destiny’s Embrace right before I gave it to her, but before it looked like—”

Aqua extends her hand and Kairi’s entire body twinges. Destiny’s Embrace materializes right before her very eyes—in Aqua’s grip, where it shimmers. Aqua gasps as the gold and floral décor bleeds away into something darker, sharper, all straight lines and angles.

“That,” Riku says weakly.

Aqua stares at the blade in her hands for a long, heavy moment. And then she laughs. It’s not a pleasant sound—rough around the edges, sharp, like she’s out of practice.

Riku, wide-eyed and red-faced, extends a hesitant hand. “Is everything…?”

The laughter fades as suddenly as it had come, and suddenly the room seems darker. There’s a sad smile on Aqua’s face as she sighs and examines the Keyblade, tracing the circular hilt with a lazy finger. “The Keyblade I have now belonged to my Master,” she says softly. “But before that, I had _this._ Stormfall.”

And Kairi feels her stomach drop to the floor, watching Aqua watch her weapon— _Kairi’s_ weapon, she wants to say, but the words are too thick for speech.

“And yet you have the power,” Aqua murmurs, and looks straight at Kairi. “You’ve been learning how to wield it?”

“She’s been training with Merlin,” Riku begins, before Aqua raises a hand to silence him.

So Kairi steps forward, her heart fluttering in her chest. “I haven’t trained for very long, but I’m learning as much as I can. I wanted to learn how to fight, so I could help my friends and...” _Be useful,_ she wants to say, but the words don’t come out. Instead she finishes with a determined, “I want to keep them safe.”

Aqua doesn’t say anything at first—and then she stands, unsteady on her feet. Kairi’s convinced that force of will alone is keeping her upright. Stormfall—Destiny’s Embrace?—falls to her side. “You need more than that,” she says softly. “Wanting. It won’t be enough.”

Kairi fights to keep her hands from balling into fists, or grabbing for the Keyblade; her sudden hurt bleeds into her words instead. “Then what do I need to do?”

Aqua doesn’t answer right away, but turns to the rippling shadows on the floor. “I’m… sorry, but that’s all I can do for tonight. Tell Mickey and Yen Sid that I’ll see them tomorrow afternoon.”

_But my Keyblade,_ Kairi almost says, before Riku rests a heavy hand on her shoulder.  

“Thank you for meeting with us,” Riku says, and bows low. Kairi follows hesitantly, refusing to meet the young Master’s eyes. “C’mon, Kairi.”

Kairi says nothing, just follows him out. She’s about to close the door when she hears Aqua whisper, “Please don’t close it.”

And she looks so sad and _broken_ , holding her long-lost blade in her hands, that Kairi doesn’t even protest. She leaves it wide open and walks into the golden hallway light.

+

“So what, you don’t even have a Keyblade anymore?”

She hates the sympathy in Lea’s eyes. She hates being forced to listen at the door of Yen Sid’s chambers where the three _Masters_ are talking about _important things_ and _wasn’t this what she was training for_ , to not be forced out of important talks like these?

“I tried summoning it back when we left, but it wouldn’t…” She flexes her hold, just in case, but Destiny’s Embrace— _Stormfall_ , she corrects herself, and the thought feels icky even inside her head—doesn’t come. She’d already taken the warm, too-heavy weight of the weapon for granted, already feels like she’s been robbed of something important.

To her great surprise, Lea hands her a small leather-bound book. “Nicked it from Yen Sid’s shelf,” he says, when Kairi looks up at him. “Some old account of the Keyblades. Apparently they have ‘minds of their own’ and bond with their wielders.”

Kairi furrows her brow. “I mean, that makes sense, but—”

“Look, Riku gave you that Keyblade out of nowhere, right? You didn’t earn it, you just used it. You might’ve spent some time playing around with it, and that’s great, but that was just… what, a few weeks at most? In a chamber where time didn’t even matter? She grew up with that thing. The two have history.”

_You don’t_ goes unsaid, and feels worse for its silence. She bows her head, pulling her knees to her chest. “So… this training was all for nothing?”

“Not what I said.” She hears Lea shift beside her, tucked in the rounded corner of the room. “You just… there’s a dream you have to have, I think. I remember a lot of red in mine.”

She sighs, then chuckles. “I didn’t take you for a book guy.”

“I’m not, but I got desperate while trying to make mine come. Hush,” he says, when Kairi snickers. “Look, according to some old dead guy, that’s how you get your own Keyblade. So focus on that, instead of fighting for one that still has feelings for that bi—”

The door suddenly slams open. Master Aqua, eerily composed in a silent fury, storms out of Yen Sid’s chambers with her fists clenched tight. Mickey is seconds behind her, pleading. Their voices echo long after they’ve descended the long staircase.

She looks up to see Riku, flustered and pouting. He sees them and quirks his brow. “Were you… spying on us?”

“Didn’t leave us much of a choice, did you?” Lea retorts, springing up to stand. “What the hell even happened back there?”

He doesn’t meet their eyes when he says, “She, uh… is under house arrest.”

What the _hell?_ Lea’s surprised laughter fills the hallway; Kairi, less amused and more bewildered, furrows her brow as she eyes Riku and asks, “What does that mean?”

“She wants to go search for her friends, but obviously isn’t in _any shape_ to go out and do that. Never mind that we don’t know where her friend Terra is, or Ven’s… heart?” Riku holds his head in his hands. “I’m not sure what just happened in there. Be glad you weren’t forced to sit through it. Point is, Mickey and I are supposed to make sure she doesn’t leave before she’s ready to.”

It’s one of the most ridiculous things she’s ever heard. Kairi huffs, pushing herself up. “Did she say anything about my Keyblade?”

Riku shakes his head. “Sorry, Kai. But we’re… we’re going to make sure this gets fixed. Maybe once she’s calmed down, I’ll talk to her—we’ll,” he amends, which must mean she looks as mad as she feels, “ _we’ll_ talk to her. First thing tomorrow?”

Breathe. There’s pressure in her palm; she looks down to realize they’ve curled into _fists_ , which is strange. “First thing, Riku,” she says. She keeps a careful hold on the little book and heads back down to her bedroom. If she can’t train, she can at least get some rest.

+

This is the key.

When she wakes up in the middle of the night—or not, because it’s _always twilight here_ —her heart is racing; things look shiny around the edges, like glass reflecting light. She remembers tiny twitching fingers and big yellow eyes from black faces, and pink _everything_ ; she remembers a city full of flowers, and her own small hands grabbing onto something small. Something tugs at the back of her mind, a voice half-remembered. Her skin is paler somehow, like it’s lost the tan from years on the islands. Like it’s not her skin at all.

_Try it now_ , a tiny voice tells her, and Kairi almost sobs.

She trusts Naminé, implicitly. So when she extends her hand and takes a breath, when she pushes forward—the weight fills her hands, balanced and warm and _right_. And Destiny’s Embrace is there, right before her eyes. She almost drops it she’s so excited, and muffles her delighted yell. Her heart is fluttering, like it’s beating for two people.

_You have to go,_ Naminé tells her, before retreating. She feels it, too, when her Nobody dips back into slumber. Kairi nods, dismissing the Keyblade and slipping back into her normal clothes.

It’s a short walk to Master Aqua’s temporary bedroom, or maybe it seems quicker because she’s light on her feet and determined. She knows she has the right one because the door is open, and Riku is there, sitting on a chair with his arms crossed and that weary look in his eyes. She meets them, and Riku nods her in.

Aqua is laying down on the bed with the covers over her; she is not asleep. A few nights rest and several good meals have brought back some of the color in her skin and brightness in her eyes, though it’s hard to tell in the darkness. Kairi lays a hand on Riku’s shoulder and murmurs, “I’ll take watch.” The older Master seems interested by this.

Riku is even more so. “You don’t have to do this.”

“I wasn’t sleeping anyway,” Kairi says. “Get some sleep. You have to recover, too.”

He meets her right in the eye, sighs, and nods. “Okay. Mickey’s just down the hallway, he’s easy to wake up if you need him.”

She won’t. But she sits in Riku’s chair when he leaves it, watches him go down the hall and back to his room—the one right next to hers, enough away for Kairi to turn back to Aqua.

“I didn’t know you’d been recruited,” the blue-haired Master says.

Kairi doesn’t answer, but summons Destiny’s Embrace.

Aqua shoots out of her bed, her mouth wide open and her eyes wary. She extends her own hand in a motion that’s all-too-quickly becoming familiar to Kairi. Stormfall fills it with an explosion of rose petals. Kairi doesn’t miss Aqua’s finger gently stroking the grip. “But…”

“There were monsters,” Kairi says slowly. “You were the only adult around. I was scared, and ran to you. I grabbed your Keyblade.” She takes a deep breath. “I remember that now. I didn’t before.”

“That means... you’re my,” Aqua starts, and brings her free hand to her mouth.

“Your apprentice,” Kairi says, then pauses. “Technically. And I have my own Keyblade now, so… you can’t take it away again.” Or at least, she hadn’t read in the book that she could.

Stormfall disappears with a whisper. Aqua’s hands grab her head. She curls into herself. Kairi clears her throat, suddenly feeling far less brave. “Do you… did you take it away because you didn’t think I could—”

“I failed.”

Kairi pauses. Aqua looks up at her, cheeks wet and eyes glassy. “I doomed you all to this… this fight with Xehanort, the pain of the Keyblade. I… couldn’t save them. Terra and Ven, Sora and Riku… or you,” she finishes, wiping her eyes with the heel of her hand. “I apologize. The other night. I wasn’t… thinking straight.”

She dismisses Destiny’s Embrace and moves forward slowly. Aqua watches her warily but doesn’t move, doesn’t flinch away.

“I spent so long trying not to go _mad_ down there, I didn’t realize what would happen when I got out. What I would _be_ when I got out. There’s still so much to do…”

“You’re really under house arrest?” Kairi asks.

Aqua’s laugh doesn’t startle her this time; it isn’t as manic, only sad, and Kairi knows sad laughs better than she should. “They mean well. But I can’t rest now. I promised my friends.”

It takes a moment for Kairi to react; when she does, it’s to stand up off the bed and extend her hand to Aqua, empty and welcoming. “Then I guess we have to go find them, huh?”

Aqua blinks slowly, tilting her head. “What do you…?”

“I don’t know if Riku’s told you, but I’m awful at staying where I should.” She grins. “If we’re quiet, we could probably sneak into the Gummi Ship and take off. Do you know how to work one?”

“That thing, right?” Aqua asks, standing up. She’s stabler on her feet tonight. “No. But we won’t need one.”

Kairi half-expects Stormfall to reappear in the flash of light, but this is a different Keyblade: dark gray and dull silver. The teeth are shaped in a blocky “E” and Kairi gasps. “That was… your Master’s?”

“It’s the only blade that will get us back to Ventus,” she says, and points it to the window. The bluish portal opens with only a whisper and a soft rush of wind, and Kairi gapes into the light. Only the soft touch against her hand brings her out of her trance. Master Aqua stands beside her, one hand tight on her blade and the other brushing against Kairi’s. “It might be dangerous. Normally new wielders are sent on easier missions.”

She blinks. “Just the other day you took my Keyblade away.”

“I was wrong,” she says softly. “And as much as I don't like you being involved in this... you are. So you need to be prepared. There's only so much you can learn by fighting against friends.” There's a sadness in her smile, a hard light in her eyes when she looks to Kairi. “Are you ready?”

She feels enough guilt to scribble out a message to Riku and the King— _going to check up on Ven, don’t worry about us, sorry. K+A._ She leaves it with Aqua’s finished plate, right on top of the sandwich scraps and finished glass of juice. She’s practically bouncing with anticipation. This is what she’s been training for. This is what she’s been _wanting_ since that day in the Castle that Never Was, surrounded by white walls and black Heartless. Destiny’s Embrace is just a tug away, a waiting presence in the back of her mind.

“Let’s go,” she says, and guides them into the light.


End file.
